M/S PILSUDSKI. sailed for her first transatlantic voyage, Gdynia-New York, under command of legendary captain Mamert Stankiewicz ("You mean the Captain" book) on Sep 15/ 1935. The trip was smooth, weather was great and the welcome in New York was enthusiastic. The New York's port-pilots admitted that even the M/S Normandie, which came to N.York as a first time, a couple of months earlier, didn't have such wonderful welcome. The second voyage from Gdynia to N. York wasn't so nice due to the stormy weather. The ship went to the rough engineering test in the middle of Atlantic. There were many unpleasant surprises for captain, crew and passengers in regards to the quality of the ship's engineering. M/S PILSUDSKI didn't keep proper balance and stability while struggling with the stormy ocean. Also some parts of the decks' structures weren't strong enough to resist the storm. M/S PILSUDSKI arrived to N.York considerably damaged; much repairs and modification needed to be done. The mentioned second voyage, was however a great help for designers and engineers to correct the plans of the other twin; M/S BATORY, as the ship was still under construction in Italian shipyard. Each round trip, Gdynia-New York-Gdynia took about three and half weeks. During the whole of the pre-war period, each year there were about ten round trips, with additional cruises to the Norwegian fiords in summer and Caribbean during the Christmas, New Year time. There was always an almost full complement of passengers on both ships. Both, M/S BATORY and PILSUDSKI were gaining popularity amongst foreign passengers, thanks to the efforts of the officers and crew, management, service and excellent Polish cuisine. The British often called M/S BATORY, the little QUEEN ELIZABETH because of some similarity of silhouette. However, it needs to be say again that not all voyages ran smoothly... Voyage 13 turned out to be ill-fated, a fire breaking out in the engine room on June 3, 1937, when BATORY was over 800 miles away from N. York. Luckily it was managed to extinguish the fire quickly, but it still took almost a month in N. York to repair the damage. After this fire, which was due to negligence on the part of the engineers during bunkering in Copenhagen, there was a series of fires later, most accidents being due to neglect by passengers or even crew members (burning cigarette-ends), short-circuiting of electrical installation, or selfingnition of cotton or garbage. There were however, some cases in which everything pointed unmistakably to the fact that BATORY was the object of sabotage activities. Luckily it was managed to extinguish such fires at their sources, but the instigators were never discovered. Such fires could have been the work of Nazi saboteurs, Ukrainian nationalists, or even rival shipping firms. When the WW II broke out and Poland fell to the Germans in September 1939, the M/S PILSUDSKI and M/S BATORY with Polish crews, were commandeered by the British for military use. Two months later, M/S PILSUDSKI was destroyed by a German mines. The two magnetic mines exploded just under her hull at 4,36 am on Nov 25/1939. The ship was sinking for four hours. The entire crew was rescued with two exception... one of the mechanic and captain Mamert Stankiewicz were death. The grave site for M/S PILSUDSKI was located at the English coast: 53, 49, 3 North - 0, 34, 1 East. M/S BATORY survived the war years (1939-45) being known as a "Lucky Ship" due to her wartime successes... She took part in many military action: evacuation of the French-Polish-British corps from Narvik (1940), evacuation of allied troops from St. Nazaire and St. Jean de Luz (1940), invasion of Algier and Sicily (1942), military voyages to India(1943), six months services as a troop carrier from Egypt to Italy (1943), invasion of southern France... Also, the two very special voyages in military convoys need to be mentioned - both under command of captain Zygmunt Deyczakowski... The first was in July 1940 (Greenock Navy Base, England - Halifax, Canada) when M/S BATORY was carrying a small fraction of Poland's art treasures to safety in Canada. The consignment included Szczerbiec, the 1320 Polish Coronation sword, a Gutenberg Bible, 136 huge tapestries which had been commissioned by King Sigismund 11 Augustus in the 16th century (collection of the Wawel Castle in Krakov), 36 Chopin manuscripts. Also, the ship was carrying several hundreds of millions of dollars worth of gold bars - reserves of the Bank of England which were being sent to the Bank of Canada for safe keeping. It was probably the richest treasure afloat - ever. Her Majesty's Royal Navy provided a convoy of heavily armed escorts for BATORY - a battleship and assorted destroyers and cruisers. As the convoy neared Newfoundland, Canadian waters fighters planes and bombers flew overhead air cover. BATORY docked in Halifax July 13, 1940. The treasures filled two rail cars and they were sent off to Ottawa to safety. The other Polish ship M/S SOBIESKI was also sailed in that convoy. The second very special trip in fall of 1940 was the voyage from Liverpool, England to Australia. M/S BATORY had on board British troops for transport to Singapore and also 480 British children being evacuated to Australia. Initially the children were only to be taken to Cape Town, but the bonds of friendship which had grown between the English, Welsh and Scottish children and the Polish crew influenced the British Admiralty to change its decision. As a result, the M/S BATORY carried the British children to the Australian ports of Fremantle, Melbourne, and Sydney, traveling over 20,000 miles in 72 days. This voyage went down in history as that of the "SINGING SHIP"; three books have since been written about it by those in charge of the children. The attitude of Polish crew during that voyage gained them not only the gratitude of those evacuated, but also enthusiastic praise from both Australian and British authorities. |
During the WW II war (1939-45), both ships were in the military service. On May14/1940 at 11,40 pm, German's bombs were dropped over M/S CHROBRY while she was sailing Norwegian Sea having Alliance's troops on aboard. The ship got into a heavy fire and sunk within a 1,5 day not so far from Narvik: 67, 40 North - 13, 50 East (Vestfiord). There were 300 soldiers killed in that accident. British, small war-ship WOLVERINE rescued 694 people. The other twin, M/S SOBIESKI survived the war. She participated in many convoys as a troop-cargo ship. One of the famous voyage was the trip, along with M/S BATORY from England to Canada carrying the huge load of British Gold Reserves. After the war (1946-50), M/S SOBIESKI was in service under Polish colors on Genua New York line. In 1950, she was sold to USSR and renamed M/S GRUZIJA. The soviet city Odessa became her new homeport; she was sailing regularly the Black Sea and occasionally sailing from Odessa to Havana-Cuba. M/S GRUZIJA was scrapped in La Spezia Scrapyard-Italy in April 1975. The above information based on articles from: "Ship Monthly" by Peter C. Kohler, "Maritime Matters", "Ksiega Statkow Polskich"- J. Micinski, B. Huras, M. Twardowski, "The Great Luxury Liners-Web Site", "Krolewski Statek Batory"- J. Pertek, "Varsity-Ocean Liners" by Ch. Paolino, "Unofficial Holland Americfa Line Home Page", "Rocznik Gdynski"- J. Kortylewski, Interviews with crew members by author of this web site. Thank you / Dziekuje |
peter7000 homepage TS/S STEFAN BATORY - Polish Ocean Liner |
PREDECESSORS OF TS/S STEFAN BATORY... M/S BATORY (1936-71) AND OTHERS Among all of the Polish passenger ships only the M/S BATORY went into the long-time, regular transatlantic service (1947-68) after the Second World War (WW II), becoming the immediate predecessor of TS/S STEFAN BATORY. Here is some more information not only about the "Lucky Ship" M/S BATORY, but also about the other Polish ocean liners... POLISH OCEAN LINERS S/S POLONIA - ex KURSK, POLONIE 1910-38; scrapped, 800 passengers, 7,858 tons, 14 knots S/S PULASKI - ex CAR, ESTONIA 1912-49; scrapped, 789 passengers, 6,503 tons, 14 knots, never back to Poland after WW II S/S KOSCIUSZKO - ex CARYCA, LITUANIA 1915-50; scrapped, 712 passengers, 6,522 tons, 14 knots, never back to Poland after WW II M/S PILSUDSKI - 1935-39; destroyed in WWII, 773 passengers, 14,294 tons, 18 knots M/S BATORY - (Lucky Ship) 1936-71; scrapped, 760 passengers, 14,287 tons, 18 knots M/S SOBIESKI - 1939-75; sold to USSR, then scrapped as M/S GRUZIJA, 1154 passengers, 11,030 tons, 17 knots M/S CHROBRY - 1939-40; destroyed in WWII, 1167 passengers, 11,442 tons, 17 knots TS/S STEFAN BATORY - 1952-00; sold, then scrapped as TS/S STEFAN, 776 passengers, 16,000 tons, 17 knots S/S; Steam Ship S/M; Motor Ship TS/S; Turbine Steam Ship S/S POLONIA, S/S PULASKI, S/S KOSCIUSZKO The Polish Transatlantic Shipping Company was founded in 1930, to establish Poland on the North Atlantic. It was transformed into Gdynia-America Line (GAL) soon later. The GAL purchased the Baltic American Line from Denmark and its three steam ships, the 7,800-tons S/S POLONIA and the 6,500 tons twins S/S ESTONIA (PULASKI) and S/S LITUANIA (KOSCIUSZKO) - all build in English shipyard, Barclay, Curle & Co. in Glasgow in years 1910-15. The ships were also known as PRINCESS DAGMARA'S GEMS as the Danish princess Dagmara used her jewels to financed the construction of those ships after she was married to Russian car Alexander III. The ships were in GAL's service mostly on the North American and South American Lines bringing many Polish and other European immigrants over there. The ships also sailed on cruise voyages to the countries of Northern and Western Europe and to the Mediterranean. The S/S POLONIA was called "Grand-Orient-Lux-Torpeda" at that time ! (She was scrapped in 1938). Captain and writer K.O. Borchardt describes some of those trips in his fascinated book "Znaczy kapitan" ("You mean the captain"). During the WW II war S/S PULASKI and S/S KOSCIUSZKO were in military service. After the war's years both ships sailed under British colors and never come back to Poland. |
During the WW II war (1939-45), both ships were in the military service. On May14/1940 at 11,40 pm, German's bombs were dropped over M/S CHROBRY while she was sailing Norwegian Sea having Alliance's troops on aboard. The ship got into a heavy fire and sunk within a 1,5 day not so far from Narvik: 67, 40 North - 13, 50 East (Vestfiord). There were 300 soldiers killed in that accident. British, small war-ship WOLVERINE rescued 694 people. The other twin, M/S SOBIESKI survived the war. She participated in many convoys as a troop-cargo ship. One of the famous voyage was the trip, along with M/S BATORY from England to Canada carrying the huge load of British Gold Reserves. After the war (1946-50), M/S SOBIESKI was in service under Polish colors on Genua New York line. In 1950, she was sold to USSR and renamed M/S GRUZIJA. The soviet city Odessa became her new homeport; she was sailing regularly the Black Sea and occasionally sailing from Odessa to Havana-Cuba. M/S GRUZIJA was scrapped in La Spezia Scrapyard-Italy in April 1975. The above information based on articles from: "Ship Monthly" by Peter C. Kohler, "Maritime Matters", "Ksiega Statkow Polskich"- J. Micinski, B. Huras, M. Twardowski, "The Great Luxury Liners-Web Site", "Krolewski Statek Batory"- J. Pertek, "Varsity-Ocean Liners" by Ch. Paolino, "Unofficial Holland Americfa Line Home Page", "Rocznik Gdynski"- J. Kortylewski, Interviews with crew members by author of this web site. Thank you / Dziekuje |
M/S PILSUDSKI, M/S BATORY * Gdynia America Line (GAL) soon realized bigger, newer ships were needed for their growing business, but could do nothing without sufficient cash reserves. A novel solution developed: Poland gave Italy five years worth of coal shipments in return for two 14,000-tons passenger ships, which became the S/S BATORY and S/S PILSUDSKI. These were twin-stackers built in Cantieri Riuniti del' Adriatico Shipyard, Triest-Monfalcone (Italy): 526 feet (160,3 m) long and could make 18 knots. Accommodation was for 796 in three classes ( 46 First Class, 370 Tourist -equivalent to 2nd Class, 400 Third Class and crew of 350. PILSUDSKI was finished first in the summer of 1935, with the BATORY following in spring of 1936. The new ships had materials and equipment that came from not less than a dozen countries. Affectionately they were dubbed the "International Ships". Kitchen utensils, kettles, fire-fighting gear and gyrocompasses came from USA. The anchors, laundry machines and refrigerating plants were from Denmark. Czechoslovakia furnished the iron used in the hull; England provided the steering gear, boilers and propellers; Scotland contributed the distilling plants; the bow and stern portions were delivered by Hungary; sheets of plating came from Austria; the life boat davits and switchboards from Germany; and the fuel pumps and engine parts from Switzerland. Although both PILSUDSKI i BATORY were built according to foreign design and in a foreign yard, the furnishing and interior decoration of the accommodation for both were designed and produced by Polish architects and artists, so as to emphasize the Polish character of the vessels which were to act as links between the Polish immigrants in America and their native country. |
M/S PILSUDSKI. sailed for her first transatlantic voyage, Gdynia-New York, under command of legendary captain Mamert Stankiewicz ("You mean the Captain" book) on Sep 15/ 1935. The trip was smooth, weather was great and the welcome in New York was enthusiastic. The New York's port-pilots admitted that even the M/S Normandie, which came to N.York as a first time, a couple of months earlier, didn't have such wonderful welcome. The second voyage from Gdynia to N. York wasn't so nice due to the stormy weather. The ship went to the rough engineering test in the middle of Atlantic. There were many unpleasant surprises for captain, crew and passengers in regards to the quality of the ship's engineering. M/S PILSUDSKI didn't keep proper balance and stability while struggling with the stormy ocean. Also some parts of the decks' structures weren't strong enough to resist the storm. M/S PILSUDSKI arrived to N.York considerably damaged; much repairs and modification needed to be done. The mentioned second voyage, was however a great help for designers and engineers to correct the plans of the other twin; M/S BATORY, as the ship was still under construction in Italian shipyard. Each round trip, Gdynia-New York-Gdynia took about three and half weeks. During the whole of the pre-war period, each year there were about ten round trips, with additional cruises to the Norwegian fiords in summer and Caribbean during the Christmas, New Year time. There was always an almost full complement of passengers on both ships. Both, M/S BATORY and PILSUDSKI were gaining popularity amongst foreign passengers, thanks to the efforts of the officers and crew, management, service and excellent Polish cuisine. The British often called M/S BATORY, the little QUEEN ELIZABETH because of some similarity of silhouette. However, it needs to be say again that not all voyages ran smoothly... Voyage 13 turned out to be ill-fated, a fire breaking out in the engine room on June 3, 1937, when BATORY was over 800 miles away from N. York. Luckily it was managed to extinguish the fire quickly, but it still took almost a month in N. York to repair the damage. After this fire, which was due to negligence on the part of the engineers during bunkering in Copenhagen, there was a series of fires later, most accidents being due to neglect by passengers or even crew members (burning cigarette-ends), short-circuiting of electrical installation, or selfingnition of cotton or garbage. There were however, some cases in which everything pointed unmistakably to the fact that BATORY was the object of sabotage activities. Luckily it was managed to extinguish such fires at their sources, but the instigators were never discovered. Such fires could have been the work of Nazi saboteurs, Ukrainian nationalists, or even rival shipping firms. When the WW II broke out and Poland fell to the Germans in September 1939, the M/S PILSUDSKI and M/S BATORY with Polish crews, were commandeered by the British for military use. Two months later, M/S PILSUDSKI was destroyed by a German mines. The two magnetic mines exploded just under her hull at 4,36 am on Nov 25/1939. The ship was sinking for four hours. The entire crew was rescued with two exception... one of the mechanic and captain Mamert Stankiewicz were death. The grave site for M/S PILSUDSKI was located at the English coast: 53, 49, 3 North - 0, 34, 1 East. M/S BATORY survived the war years (1939-45) being known as a "Lucky Ship" due to her wartime successes... She took part in many military action: evacuation of the French-Polish-British corps from Narvik (1940), evacuation of allied troops from St. Nazaire and St. Jean de Luz (1940), invasion of Algier and Sicily (1942), military voyages to India(1943), six months services as a troop carrier from Egypt to Italy (1943), invasion of southern France... Also, the two very special voyages in military convoys need to be mentioned - both under command of captain Zygmunt Deyczakowski... The first was in July 1940 (Greenock Navy Base, England - Halifax, Canada) when M/S BATORY was carrying a small fraction of Poland's art treasures to safety in Canada. The consignment included Szczerbiec, the 1320 Polish Coronation sword, a Gutenberg Bible, 136 huge tapestries which had been commissioned by King Sigismund 11 Augustus in the 16th century (collection of the Wawel Castle in Krakov), 36 Chopin manuscripts. Also, the ship was carrying several hundreds of millions of dollars worth of gold bars - reserves of the Bank of England which were being sent to the Bank of Canada for safe keeping. It was probably the richest treasure afloat - ever. Her Majesty's Royal Navy provided a convoy of heavily armed escorts for BATORY - a battleship and assorted destroyers and cruisers. As the convoy neared Newfoundland, Canadian waters fighters planes and bombers flew overhead air cover. BATORY docked in Halifax July 13, 1940. The treasures filled two rail cars and they were sent off to Ottawa to safety. The other Polish ship M/S SOBIESKI was also sailed in that convoy. The second very special trip in fall of 1940 was the voyage from Liverpool, England to Australia. M/S BATORY had on board British troops for transport to Singapore and also 480 British children being evacuated to Australia. Initially the children were only to be taken to Cape Town, but the bonds of friendship which had grown between the English, Welsh and Scottish children and the Polish crew influenced the British Admiralty to change its decision. As a result, the M/S BATORY carried the British children to the Australian ports of Fremantle, Melbourne, and Sydney, traveling over 20,000 miles in 72 days. This voyage went down in history as that of the "SINGING SHIP"; three books have since been written about it by those in charge of the children. The attitude of Polish crew during that voyage gained them not only the gratitude of those evacuated, but also enthusiastic praise from both Australian and British authorities. |
After the WW II war, M/S BATORY returned to the Transatlantic trade following a refit in Antwerp in 1947. Beginning in May 1949 and lasting through January 1951, the BATORY of the Polish Ocean Lines was the subject of a series of political incidents relating to the Cold War years (late '40 and '50). The most serious was the accusation of smuggling an atomic bomb to USA (!) and other that an alleged spy had escaped from New York aboard her. The situation climaxed when American port workers and repairmen refused to handle the ship. The M/S BATORY had to be withdraw and was rerouted on a new service from Poland to India and Pakistan via the Suez Canal. The ship's hull was repainted from black, to light grey at that time. She returned to the North Atlantic, sailing to Montreal instead of New York, in 1957, following yet another refit, this time in Bremerhaven (Northern Germany), where the hull was painted black again. The accommodations were revised to 76 first class and 740 tourist class. At the end of her service, M/S BATORY was given a very moving farewell which was organized on Feb 20/1969 at Tilbury (London, England) with the British participants in the "Australian voyage of evacuee children", which was mentioned earlier. Even the British press had to admit that the Polish ship was given such farewell as not even the famous British "Queens" received. During many years of service, M/S BATORY carried out 222 round trips across the oceans, first on the New York run, later the India Line and finally the Canadian Line, carrying over 270,000 passengers altogether. She also did about 75 cruises, tourist trips, transportation of children to Poland for summer holidays over 30,000 persons took part in these. During her war time service of over six years, she carried about 120,000 soldiers. She visited about 150 ports in all parts of the globe. So successful was the BATORY on the Poland-Canada run, that construction of a new liner was considered. However, in the end used tonnage proved more practical, and POL purchased the 16,000-tons TS/S MAASDAM from Holland America in 1969, renaming her TS/S STEFAN BATORY. The old M/S BATORY retired in 1968, served as a floating hotel-restaurant-museum in Gdynia for two years, but showing deficit in this new role, was sold for $ 570,000 to the Shipbreaker Yard in Hong Kong in 1971. In her last voyage to Hong Kong, M/S BATORY sailed under command of captain Krzysztof Meissner. |
M/S SOBIESKI, M/S CHROBRY M/S SOBIESKI and CHROBRY- royal twins named after two Polish kings, were build to replace aging S/S KOSCIUSZKO and PULASKI on the South America Line. Although the ships were almost identical, each vessel was built in different shipyard: M/S SOBIESKI (1937), Swan Hunter & Wigham Richard Shipyard, Newcastle-England, M/S CHROBRY (1939), Nakskov Skibsvaerft Shipyard, Nakskov-Denmark. Both ships had almost the same characteristic: 11,000 tons, speed 17 knots, two engine of total power of 11250 HP, length 156m, 1100 passengers (350 regular passengers plus 750 additional if needed). The ships were designed as a passenger-cargo vessels and there was a flexibility of converting some of the cargo space into a very basic passenger's/immigrant's space. That's why the ships, being smaller, could take more passengers than BATORY or PILSUDSKI. |
Princess Dagmara's Gems; S/S POLONIA, S/S PULASKI, S/S KOSCIUSZKO |
S/S POLONIA is entering port of Constanta, Romania (Black Sea), 1935 |
The sister ships project by Cantieri Riunity del' Adriatico Shipyard from Triest, Italy 1935: M/S PILSUDSKI - M/S BATORY |
M/S PILSUDSKI 1935 - 1939 |
M/S BATORY 1936 - 1971 |
M/S SOBIESKI 1939-1975; sold do USSR and renamed M/S GRUZIJA in 1950 |
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